The other side of Hiring

Shahrukh and Salman joined in as sales associates in Delhi and Kolkata operations of a leading national bank (in an alternate universe, they are highly paid movie stars)

After a year, Shahrukh got promoted to a team lead, whereas Salman was put onto the Performance improvement plan and was asked to leave after two months. It is your typical corporate story; Survival of the fittest. Shahrukh performed well and rewarded accordingly for it. Salman was just not cut out for a sales role.

Plain and simple, or is it? Let's see this from the inside out.

Shahrukh's manager Amitabh is a veteran of the industry knows in and out and is an excellent mentor. All his reports are now managing an individual division or a team. Salman's manager Hrithik is a rookie. He is still searching for his place in the organization. He wooed everyone from the recruiter to the hiring manager by his accolades. He was the sales head for a gym chain before joining this organization. There is just one problem; it has been two years, and the Kolkata branch is falling like a house of cards on the verge of closing. Where did the organization go wrong? is there more than meets the eye? 

How would you see this situation if I tell you that Salman became the sales head for a competitor bank in the next five years?

The problem is not that we don't know, but these factors do not get their due weightage in the hiring decision-making process.

See beyond Numbers

There is a business requirement, and the sales head has crunched the numbers on his beautifully formatted excel worksheet that he is proud of. "Two additional resources are required to meet the target for Surat" he said. Unless we have robots employed in Surat (it will take some time), there is no black and white answer. By no means, I am undermining the significance of Data. I am saying there is an additional Human resource layer, a filter that needs to be applied.  

Is the manager in Surat capable of handling the team? Can She/He train the new members alone? Do we have the requisite know-how in our L&D to train the new members? And the list is endless, depending on the requirement. 

How may I help you?

When you hire someone, no matter how amazing that person is, She/He will go through a learning curve, the corporate idiom "hit the ground running" which is used more often than it should be is not valid in most of the case. She/he will have his learning curve; work-related as well as cultural.  

If you have an experienced team and they are willing to help, "willing to help" is the key phrase here. This can shorten the learning curve considerably. No L&D or On-boarding plan can teach you what you learn from people who are doing it for years and willing to teach. Again, I cannot emphasize this enough "willing to teach" is the key phrase!  

And when would a team member be willing to teach? Only if they are Capable, Happy, and Secure about their place in the organization!

There is a hole in the bucket

Ramesh is the VP of sales for an FMCG company. He has this fantastic quality of being in the good books of his direct reporting manager. He has painted a picture of him being a capable and integral resource for the organization. But if you ask his direct reports, you will see cracks in his story, and things don't add up there. They are doing his work, slogging in hours for him, getting no support whatsoever, and not happy with his leadership style, but he knows how to present what his team has done!

He is what I call a Glib Leader. He talks well!

Now, no matter whom you hire, if Ramesh is the manager, it is doubtful that you will get your ROI from that resource. You are just burning your cash. You are filling a bucket with a hole at the bottom.

And don't forget the additional training cost and most important and neglected aspect in all this, your organization will not reach its goal. You are better off not hiring. Instead, use the resource to coach Ramesh and plan a course correction for him to manage his team better while you still can! 

It becomes all the more critical, especially in the current scenario, to look at these factors and think of conditions inside the organization before taking that hiring call!